Istanbul Medeniyet University Sustainability Club and Sustainability Office continue to develop projects to reduce the amount of waste produced by our campus community and its environmental footprint.
IMU Sustainability Club has started to receive the first outputs of the social responsibility project it initiated to recycle the waste paper collected and sorted within the campus areas of our University in 2024. In cooperation with the IMU Sustainability Office, the Club members presented flower seed cards to the female staff and female students of our University to emphasize the importance of women’s participation in the workforce on March 8, International Women’s Day.
The Sustainability Club used old calendars collected from employees at the end of 2023 to prepare the seed cards. The collected calendars were recycled and to make new paper during workshops held at the Sustainability Office on March 6, 7 and 8, 2024. Various wildflower seeds were added to the paper. The project team stated that instead of giving plucked flowers as gifts to our female staff and students, they aimed to have a piece of themselves in nature and support biodiversity in the city by giving seed cards. The gifts were completed by adding the seed cards to the bookmarks designed by the Sustainability Office team and presented to our female staff and students in our North Campus area.
The project team stated that in addition to supporting the University’s zero waste policy, the social responsibility project supports the reuse of used paper with the traditional method used in paper production, preventing the cutting down of new trees for consumption, and that the method applied is of great importance especially in terms of resource efficiency, as the traditional method involves much less energy and water consumption compared to factory production. The team pointed out that the paper recycling workshop enables on-site recycling of waste, reducing carbon emissions, especially from storage and transportation, and has the effect of reducing the impact on climate change. The team stated that the future productions to be realized within the project will make a significant contribution to the circular economy through recycling and reuse.
You can find detailed information about the Women’s Day seed card project and IMUSUS activities here.
